Palm mini-ecosystems

[CLINODAVE]

We love our palms, but I also dig seeing the other plants/lifeforms that make their homes in palms.  The base of this Pigafetta at my place is home to climbing ferns and a begonia.  The Vetichias' grey trunks are increasingly mossy green.  Anyone else have palm epiphyte pics?

[Really full garden]

In my highland garden it is amazing what finds its way onto palm trunks.

This is an Areca catechu with its trunk completely covered with oncidium orchids,staghorn ferns and an aroid that is about to cover everything!

[greysrigging]

Many of the trees and palms in my garden are covered in vines.... I wanted that 'tropical jungle look' and encouraged the growth. The biggest mistake I made was allowing Syngonium podophyllum into my yard. It is a dreadful weed that quickly smothers trees and palms. During the Cyclone back in March, the added wind load toppled several palms in my garden. I am forever pulling it out, but you miss one tiny bit and its back with a vengeance in the rainy season.

That's it on a couple of palms in the back yard

The Devils Ivy ( Epipremnum aureum ) rather likes my back yard and is also very in invasive in the Darwin region. Unbelievably garden centers down south sell it as a small indoor ornamental... colorful leaves, tolerant of shade.... but once released outdoors in the tropics it grows bigger and stronger than Jack's beanstalk !. The higher it gets in the tree canopy, seeking light, the bigger the leaves get. My ones, 30' up in the trees, have near on 2' diameter leaves !

I don't really mind the Philodendrons climbing up the trunks.... much slower growing and not as invasive. Leaves also get bigger the higher it reaches into the canopy.

These two have abandoned the Normanbya trunk and attached themselves to the end wall of the house.

Strangler Fig and a weedy fern species whose name escapes me at home on these palm trunks...

[NC_Palms]

This past summer in West Palm Beach, Florida. It seems like those ferns love to colonize in the palms 

[CLINODAVE]

7 hours ago, scottgt said:

In my highland garden it is amazing what finds its way onto palm trunks.

This is an Areca catechu with its trunk completely covered with oncidium orchids,staghorn ferns and an aroid that is about to cover everything!

beautiful!  I would imagine a highland climate would be great for orchids to establish on the right palm trunk.

 

[CLINODAVE]

2 hours ago, greysrigging said:

Many of the trees and palms in my garden are covered in vines.... I wanted that 'tropical jungle look' and encouraged the growth. The biggest mistake I made was allowing Syngonium podophyllum into my yard. It is a dreadful weed that quickly smothers trees and palms

Yeah that Syngonium is really a pain.  I've been watching an Epipremnum vine climbing an Alexander at my place and, like u say, the leaves are ginormous.  

[Really full garden]

This is the entrance to my office. These are 30 year old Dypsis lutescens trunks covered in a few Neoregilia cultivars and native Brassavola, Oncidium and Encyclia orchids that I have rescued from fallen or cut trees.